Gregarius » Physics Today magazine

A century of cosmic rays

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Twenty years after puzzling atmospheric ionization led to the discovery of cosmic rays, their investigation opened up particle physics. Now they’re providing a window on extragalactic astrophysics.

Mikhail Lomonosov and the dawn of Russian science

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Curiously unsung in the West, Lomonosov broke ground in physics, chemistry, and astronomy; won acclaim as a poet and historian; and was a key figure of the Russian Enlightenment.

Women in physics: A tale of limits

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

A newly completed survey of 15 000 physicists worldwide reveals that women physicists still do not have equal access to the career-advancing resources and opportunities enjoyed by their male colleagues.

Optical-fiber microcavities reach angstrom-scale precision

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Using heat and light to subtly vary the local radius and refractive index of a glass fiber is a simple and surprisingly reproducible way to create and tune a microresonator.

The Large Hadron Collider yields tantalizing hints of the Higgs boson

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

There’s not yet enough data for a convincing sighting of standard particle theory’s long-sought capstone. But there’s less and less room for it to hide.

Multiple exciton generation enhances a working solar cell

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

A single energetic photon can excite more than one electron in a nanocrystal. Collecting those electrons may be a path to higher photovoltaic efficiencies.

Crevasses may make ice shelves more stable

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

A new suitor in the carbon-14 dating game

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Tethered proteins speed up photosynthetic electron transfer

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Ocean acidification and coral reefs

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Climate scientists not cowed by relentless climate change deniers

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Groups that provide moral support, legal counsel, and swift rebuttals of misinformation are sprouting up.

Small business technology program gains new lease on life

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Six-year extension of grants act will give small companies a leg up in the scramble for increasingly scarce federal research dollars.

From cells to limbs, UK center studies war injuries

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

More people are surviving with worse injuries than ever before.

With 2012 budgets set, the outlook for R&D clouds up

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Official scientific integrity

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Astronomy education and jobs

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Discussions in scientific nuclear diplomacy

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Discussions in scientific nuclear diplomacy

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Discussions in scientific nuclear diplomacy

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Discussions in scientific nuclear diplomacy

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Discussions in scientific nuclear diplomacy

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Premature Nobel Prize decision?

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

The “Doctor” title: Respect or confusion?

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

The “Doctor” title: Respect or confusion?

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

The “Doctor” title: Respect or confusion?

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Analyses of dimensionless science

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Analyses of dimensionless science

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Analyses of dimensionless science

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Corrections

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Quantum Physics for Poets

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

An Indispensable Truth: How Fusion Power Can Save the Planet

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Quantum Computing: A Gentle Introduction

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Fractional Calculus: An Introduction for Physicists

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

New books

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Focus on bioinstrumentation and biotechnologies

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

The descriptions of the new products listed in this section are based on information supplied to us by the manufacturers. PHYSICS TODAY can assume no responsibility for their accuracy. For more information about a particular product, visit the website at the end of the product description.

Norman Foster Ramsey Jr

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Radiation meets food

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

It’s no secret that some people are wary of irradiated food. But radiation levels that effectively control pathogens have no demonstrated harmful effects on humans.

Improving organic semiconductors

Posted: January 31st, 2012, 7:00am MST

Recent developments in US patent law

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Legislation making the US the last country to abandon the first-to-invent patent system should have a significant effect on the way scientists approach patenting

Quantum numbers, Chern classes, and a bodhisattva

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

A physics Nobel laureate reflects on how he came to understand the significance of a youthful lunchtime encounter with a famous mathematician

Slow slip: A new kind of earthquake

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Sandwiched between the shallow region of sudden, infrequent earthquakes and the deeper home to continuous viscous motion lies an intermediate realm of intermittent sliding and rumbling. Discovered in recent years, it still harbors many secrets

Tides, moonlight, machines, and D-Day

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Tides, moonlight, machines, and D-Day

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Tides, moonlight, machines, and D-Day

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Correcting the Coriolis correlation

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Correcting the Coriolis correlation

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Einstein, too, miscredited Hubble’s “discovery”

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

A resource for laboratory safety

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Czech sculptor deserves credit

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Silicon carbide defects hold promise for device-friendly qubits

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Commercial-grade wafers of the popular semiconductor harbor spin states that can be coherently manipulated at room temperature.

A first glimpse of possibly primordial intergalactic gas

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Before the first stars, there were presumably no nuclei heavier than lithium. But pristine gas without a trace of stellar contamination has been elusive.

Building ultralight lattices

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

The stiffness-to-weight ratio is an important figure of merit for structural engineers. But in the ultralight regime—at densities of 10 mg/cm³ or less—few material options exist; one must turn to aerogels or foams.

Molding many-faced particles

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Wrinkled roaches and flapping flags

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Measuring morphological change

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Silicon meets the butterfly wing

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

A marriage of microscopy and image compression

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Monitoring surface diffusion, one molecule at a time

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Chief scientist Ellen Williams seeks to bring new energy to BP

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

After spending three decades in academia conducting nanotechnology research, the chemist-turned-physicist is now tackling the energy problem in the faster-paced industrial environment.

A missing variable in the clean energy equation

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Chile aims to better exploit role as telescope host

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

The country’s scientists and engineers are starting to take part in the design and construction of telescopes, a trend that could boost other industries and the economy.

NSF invites “CREATIV” research proposals

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Science fellows find policy ”a perfect fit”

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

More and Different: Notes from a Thoughtful Curmudgeon

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

The Physics of Foraging: An Introduction to Random Searches and Biological Encounters

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

The Shaping of Life: The Generation of Biological Pattern

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

An Introduction to Star Formation

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

New books

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Focus on photonics and biomedical optics

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Robert Arthur Helliwell

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Simon van der Meer

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Accelerated ion beams for art forensics

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Fluid mixing from viscous fingering

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Insights from the great 2011 Japan earthquake

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

The diverse set of waves generated in Earth’s interior, oceans, and atmosphere during the devastating Tohoku-oki earthquake reveal some extraordinary geophysics.

The formation and differentiation of Earth

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Earth accreted and segregated a metal core by a succession of large impacts before the solar system was 100 million years old.

The curious aftermath of Neptune's discovery

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Controversy following the announcement of the new planet propelled US astronomers to the international limelight.

Discoverers of the Hubble expansion’s acceleration share Nobel physics prize

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

We’ve learned from the laureates that some mysterious vacuum energy now prevails over all the matter in the cosmos.

Nobel Prize in Chemistry honors the discovery of quasicrystals

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

The realization that ordered solids needn’t be translationally periodic sent experts scrambling to rewrite the textbooks on condensed matter.

"Faked states" mimic quantum entanglement

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Bell’s inequalities are the quintessential test of the quantum nature of a system. But experiments show that the test can be fooled—if one ignores the fine print.

Physics update

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Negative ions of molecular hydrogen

Physics update

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

A handheld device for image-guided surgery

Physics update

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Aligning scattered light for pain-free diagnostics

Physics update

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

A double take on the double arc

Physics update

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Making waves with the Moon's shadow

Physics update

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

Toward an easily fabricated artificial leaf

Changes and challenges: Physics in India

Posted: November 30th, 2011, 7:00am MST

To go from having islands of excellence to being a major world player in science, India must solve such problems as a dearth of teachers and a divide between research and teaching.